The Last Polar Bear records and celebrates one of nature’s most majestic creatures — the polar bear — and examines how global warming is affecting the fragile, complex Arctic environment.

Polar bears use sea ice to move about, find mates and hunt for seals. As temperatures warm, the loss of the pack ice directly impacts their ability to survive. Scientists agree that Arctic ice is disappearing at an alarming rate. Last summer, sea ice levels plummeted to their lowest since satellite measurements began in 1979. And a new scientific study by the U.S. Geological Survey, released last fall, predicts that two-thirds of the world’s polar bears, including Alaska’s entire population, may disappear completely by 2050.

For the past eight years, wildlife photographer Steven Kazlowski traveled to the remote Beaufort and Chukcki Seas, from Point Hope in western Alaska to Herschel Island in the Yukon to photograph these magnificent creatures and record the intricacies of this delicately balanced ecosystem.

The book includes many such anecdotes of life among the bears, relayed by the photographer, Alaskan natives and Inupiaq elders. Essays written by conservationist Theodore Roosevelt IV, Natural Resources Defense Council President Frances Beinecke, cultural anthropologist Richard Nelson, environmental journalist Daniel Glick, and Alaskan residents and writers Nick Jans and Charles Wohlforth provide a more in-depth understanding of the scientific, political and social issues that surround climate change.

The book will be followed by a 10-city speaking tour in the U.S. and a national traveling museum exhibit, starting with the Burke Museum of Natural History & Culture in Seattle, Wash., June 28-December 31, 2008